February 2017

When the Archdiocese of Cincinnati garners national media attention, I’d like to think it’s for the good things going on here, e.g., swelling priestly vocations, thriving wholesome apostolates, and innovative work on the Theology of the Body, not a gabfest hosted by a race-hustling chancery official:

“It is a blessing for this archdiocese, through the archbishop, to embrace addressing racism, the pervasive gun violence, restorative justice…race relations, and mental health, that our voice has to be heard,” said Deacon Royce Winters, director of African-American ministries for the Archdiocese of Cincinnati.

“That’s what we really wanted to do was to say as big and as powerful as the voice of the Catholic Church is in the United States, we have to do our part to bring about justice and the dignity of life for all peoples,” he told CNA.

The Feb. 28 meeting of Catholic leaders at Xavier University – entitled “Promoting Peace In Our Communities” – is a continuation of a years-long effort by Catholics to restore race relations and heal social tensions in the archdiocese, Deacon Royce said.

The current and former heads of the Archdiocese of Cincinnati’s worship office are conducting a four-part workshop on the liturgy at our territorial parish next month. Dubbed Lex Orandi, Lex Credendi, Lex Vivendi, it’s been a roadshow in the AOC for at least the past dozen years with frequent stops at this parish. The current head was the co-author of an illicit licensing program* that attempted to suppress the celebration of the older form of the Mass when Pope Benedict XVI expressly liberated it (the other author used to be the parish liturgist), and the former thwarted efforts by local Catholics to restore Eucharistic adoration. That should give you some idea of the flavor of this workshop. The shame of it all is that the parish, once dominated by dissenting baby boomers, now has new young families who would benefit from genuine liturgical catechesis. For that they’ll have to make the one-mile drive to St. Cecilia.

*Interestingly enough, the guidelines, developed under Archbishop Emeritus Pilarczyk, are nowhere to be found on the archdiocesan website.

That’s how Marcus Mescher, a member of Xavier University’s theology department and a … chapel-goer at Bellarmine, ends his piece about going “beyond resistance” in the Trump era.

Really.

Funny, I don’t recall so-called conservative Catholics aping the catch-phrases of Reagan or Bush in the years that immediately followed their presidencies.

Let it suffice to say that it’s all politics all the time with this crowd.

Mescher’s cri de coeur was recommended by Ken Overberg, S.J., in one of his Bellarmine homilies, ‘natch.

Here’s a summarizing snip toward the end:

These five practices—cultivating prayer for shalom, practicing prophetic imagination, growing in advocacy, initiating inclusive dialogue and relationships, and participating in community organizing and collective action—are concrete avenues to be faithful to the demands of discipleship. …